Can God Be Trusted? (1)

Can we look at Ephesians chapter 6 please? Now it's been a long time since I've been at a lacrosse conference So it's good to be with you this weekend Ephesians chapter 6 and verse 10 Finally my brethren be strong or really it's in the passive. It's be strengthened in the Lord and in the power of his might Or in his mighty power Why do we need to be strengthened in the Lord and in his mighty power why Verse 11 put on the whole armor of God Why Now many of us know these verses But it's possible to forget Why we need to be strengthened in the Lord why we need God's spiritual armor and what follows Shows us one reason why Verse 11 put on the whole armor of God that you may be able to stand against the wiles of the devil the wiles the strategies that are calculated to deceive For we do not wrestle against flesh and blood but against principalities Against powers against the rulers of the darkness of this age against spiritual hosts of wickedness in the heavenly places I wonder if a lot of times we struggle against these Spiritual forces of wickedness the powers of darkness and we don't really realize Where the problem lies and So we try to fight these battles Just on our own because we don't see the enemy We had any struggles lately With one thing or another We need to be strengthened in the Lord We need this armor. I mean Soldiers aren't going to go into battle whether it's in Israel or in Ukraine in their pajamas But sometimes that's just what we do Verse 13 Therefore take up the whole armor of God That you may be able to withstand in the evil day and having done all to stand Stand therefore notice four times This word is stand or withstand Why why is it there so often? Because the devil wants to knock us over Take us out So we won't bring honor to the one who bled and died to save us So we won't be a blessing to God's people or people that don't know the Lord yet we're in a battle a spiritual battle and Often we don't see the enemy Notice he says that you may be able to withstand in the evil day None of us know what a day is going to bring forth Have you had any battles this past week? or month None of us know what kind of evil day I'm not trying to scare us But just to be aware That we're in a battle against an enemy that we are no match for We need this armor.

We need to be strengthened in the Lord. So in verse 14, he says stand Therefore having girded your waist with truth and now we're going to get this list of the armor I'm not going to spend a lot of time on this but the importance of truth knowing who God is His greatness his holiness as we were considering last night from Isaiah 6 knowing who we are the importance of truth Know before I was saved because I never read the Bible 25 years old knew nothing about the Bible. I thought so many things That were right were wrong and so many things that are wrong.

I thought it was right Lack of truth Then it says having put on the breastplate of righteousness now I look at this as a practical righteousness being committed to doing what's right and To me an example is Joseph in the Old Testament when Potiphar is Potiphar's wife tried to tempt him. Remember what Joseph said? How can I do this great wickedness and Sin against God he was committed to righteousness to doing what was right a great preservative in this battle we're in Verse 15 having shod your feet with the preparation of the readiness of the gospel of peace Being ready when there's opportunity to share the gospel spread the gospel 16 above all taking the shield of faith with which you will be able to quench extinguish all the fiery darts of the wicked one I Want to talk a little bit about these fiery darts and in just a minute Not just darts not just arrows That can cause damage in itself, but these are flaming Darts that Cause even more damage Brother sister we are susceptible to this to the evil ones fiery darts, and if we're not careful They can do a lot of damage Christians can fall by the wayside and It keeps us from Being what the Lord wants us to be serving him In this world where he is so desperately needed verse 17 take the helmet of salvation I was saved four years before I knew anything about eternal security and The devil can make mincemeat out of me Wondering if I was saved. I wasn't saved And it wasn't till I just rested on what on the Word of God But I got relief The assurance of salvation and The sword of the Spirit which is literally it's a word of God It's not so much the whole Bible, but a particular part of the Word of God that the Spirit of God can bring to us Just when we need it have you ever had that happen? maybe going through a struggle and Maybe in your daily reading or maybe just out of the blue the Lord brings something to your mind.

It's just what you need it Well the example of the Lord Jesus When he was tempted in the wilderness Perfect example Devil tempted him three times. What did he say? It is written. He just quoted part of the Word of God We've been encouraged to get into our Bibles You know if we're not feeding on the Word of God and putting it in then It's going to be difficult for the Spirit of God to bring it to our minds when we need it, right? I hope this isn't just theory.

I'm saying here. You're in a battle Whether it's in school in the workplace in your family in the assembly The devil wants to take us out To knock us over But God has given us Resources So this doesn't happen Just one more verse 18, I'm not I don't know if technically this is part of the armor, but to me it's Essential praying always and At the end of the verse for all the Saints praying Praying shows our dependence on the Lord isn't that how we started out in verse 10 be strengthened in the Lord recently I was reading in Isaiah and I want to turn to that now to Isaiah with you because to me. It's an illustration from the scriptures what these fiery darts are all about and just the way the devil tries to Take out his people look with me in Isaiah chapter 36, please Verse 1 I'm reading from the New King James Version if you are wondering Now it came to pass in the 14th year of King Hezekiah that Sennacherib king of Assyria King Came up against all the fortified cities of Judah and took them Then the king of Assyria sent the rabbi Sheikah with a great army from Lachish to King Hezekiah Jerusalem and he stood by the aqueduct from the upper pool on the highway to the Fuller's Field and Eliakim the son of Hilkiah who was over the household Shebna the scribe and Joah the son of Asaph the recorder came out to him Then the rabbi Sheikah said to them Say now to Hezekiah thus says their great king the king of Assyria What confidence is this in which you trust I? Say you speak of having plans and power for war, but they're mere words Now on whom do you trust? That you rebel Against me.

I don't think I would want to have been in Jerusalem in these days Assyria the feared army of Assyria noted for their cruelty their ferocity they taken most of Judah the southern kingdom and now They're at The gates of Jerusalem at the city it says a great army Probably besieging the place This was a very real Battle and I Don't know what kind of battle you're facing these days But we all face battles of one kind or another so the king sends out his Maybe military commander or general called the rabbi Sheikah here and Notice that from Judah side Hezekiah doesn't send any military people he sends part of his administration. I take it and But notice what the Assyrian man says he tells these three men from Judah This is what their great king the king of Assyria says, what are you trusting in and I paraphrase it this way What are you trusting in? That you're rebelling against me what I want to speak about for the rest of the my time here is can God be trusted Can God be trusted This is what the Assyrians are going to try to undermine with King Hezekiah and with the people they're Trying to undermine their trust in God Now does that sound familiar? With you and your spiritual battles it does with me because if we're going to do the will of God we're going to have to trust him because the bar is higher than we can accomplish on our own and There's always the temptation You know, can I trust the Lord for this now This isn't to say we can live any old way we want regardless of the Bible and just You know do whatever we want to do and then press a button and say oh, I'm going to trust the Lord now Can God be trusted in? The battle that you're facing right now, or are you being assailed with some fiery darts yeah, God's helped you here God's helped you there, but Not this one not this one It's too much Notice now these fiery darts that the rabbi Sheikha fires verse 6 This is his first one He says look you're trusting in the staff of this broken reed Egypt on which if a man leans it will go into his hand and pierce it so as Pharaoh king of Egypt to all who trust in him, so Don't trust in Egypt Okay, he's right on this one. And if we trust in the Egypt world, it's not going to work for us either But he doesn't leave it there second verse 7 But if you say to me we trust in the Lord our God Is it not he whose high places and whose altars Hezekiah is taken away and said to Judah and Jerusalem? You shall worship before this altar What's going on here? It you know to me it's interesting that these Assyrians seem to know what was happening in Judah Even without the internet without texting without email, but they knew they had heard that Hezekiah had Taken down the false altars and places of worship and Wanted people to worship at the one true place in Jerusalem So the implication is they don't realize it, but that you know God's not going to do anything for you Hezekiah.

Look what you've done. You've insulted God taking away these idols but the takeaway I get from this is you know, the devil will come and Send this start Look what you've done. Look what you haven't done.

You expect God to help you? No way arrow number three verse eight Now therefore I urge you give a pledge to my master the king of Assyria and I'll give you 2,000 horses If you're able on your part to put riders on them How then will you repel one captain of the least of my master's servants and put your trust in Egypt for chariots and horsemen? He's basically saying listen, we could give you 2,000 horses. You wouldn't know what to do with them. You don't know anything about battles with Calvary This is the latest In other words, he's just underlining their weakness against this enemy the mighty Assyrians But then the fourth arrow here in this volley verse 10 He says have I now come up without the Lord against this land to destroy it The Lord said to me go up against this land and destroy it God's not going to help you God's against you So there's no use looking to him Look what you've done You ever had battles like this So these three men from Judah they asked the rabbi Sheikah They said listen don't speak to us in Hebrew the language because there's people listening here speak to us in Aramaic and The rabbi Sheikah Says in verse 12, you know, I haven't come to just you I want to speak to the people So now here goes volley number two four more arrows Now the first volley it was to Hezekiah This one is to the people notice what he says verse 14 Well, I'm going to read the verse 13 The rabbi Sheikah stood and called out with a loud voice in Hebrew and said hear the words of the great king the king of Assyria Thus says the king Don't let Hezekiah deceive you For he will not be able to deliver you.

So here's the arrow against leadership now. Don't listen to your leader Don't let him deceive you. We've been hearing about this already.

Some people don't want to listen to the leadership that God has in an Assembly Leadership in the home and sometimes we submit to this because we think we know better verse 15 and Don't let Hezekiah make you trust in the Lord saying the Lord will surely deliver us This city will not be given into the hand of the king of Assyria Now again, how did the Assyrians know everything that was going on in Judah and what Hezekiah told the people it's amazing First he says in 14. Don't let Hezekiah deceive you 15. Don't let Hezekiah make you trust in the Lord Don't let anybody encourage you to trust in the Lord and Tell you that The Lord's going to deliver you and maybe that's going through someone's mind right now as I'm speaking Because that's what I'm trying to do with the Lord's help to encourage you to trust the Lord But there might be that thought That fiery dart Don't let Larry Perkins Deceive you don't let him encourage you to trust in the Lord.

The Lord's not going to deliver you I'll tell you the devil devil's tactics are so insidious He is so cunning He's a lot smarter than we are he's a lot more powerful than we are he's been around a long time He's got a lot of experience Brother sister, we are in an up against an enemy that we are not no match for ourselves But thank God the Lord is And I just love this section of Isaiah chapter 36 and 37, I'm not going to get all through it today But to see that God can be trusted It doesn't depend on our weakness our inability our lack of intelligence Are we willing to trust God or Are we going to try to do it this way? I'm going to trust in the Lord, but I'm going to trust in myself, too That doesn't work very well But let me go on verse 16 Don't listen to Hezekiah first. He says don't let him deceive you don't let him make you trust in the Lord now He says don't even listen to him All right anybody out there going like this don't listen to Hezekiah for thus says the king of Assyria make peace with me by a present and come out to me and Every one you of you eat from his own fine and everyone from his own fig tree and every one of you drink the waters of his own cistern Until I come and take you away to a land like your own land a land of grain and new wine a land of bread and vineyards So what's what's this fiery dart? The devil's saying I'll take care of you I'll take care of you. Don't trust the Lord.

I'll take care of you better than him verse 18 Beware lest Hezekiah persuade you saying the Lord will deliver us Has any one of the gods of the nations delivered its land from the hand of the king of Assyria? We're the gods of Hamath and Arpad. We're the gods of Sephirveim indeed have they delivered Samaria from my hand Who among all the gods of these lands have delivered their countries from my hand that the Lord should deliver Jerusalem from my hand so here's the the fourth one of this second volley look at the circumstances Look at this look at that has their God helped them and maybe you can look around and look at certain people and You Say no what they were trusting and didn't seem to work so these three men come back Tell the king chapter 37 and So it was when King Hezekiah heard it that he tore his clothes Covered himself with sackcloth and went into the house of the Lord now King Hezekiah could have done what other kings have done Appeal to another nation to come in and help them militarily But he says he tore his clothes covered himself with sackcloth. This was a sign of repentance Humiliation He's not on a high horse here.

He's taking a low place and notice he goes into the house of the Lord He's taking this battle that he's in This enemy that he's facing this challenge He's taking it to the Lord and I would suggest that if he wasn't if King Hezekiah who one of the greatest kings that Judah had if he wasn't accustomed to Taking the little things to the Lord. He may not Take this one to the Lord You know the Lord prepares us for the big battles by the little battles Didn't David experience that when he went out against Goliath? He said he first fought the bear and the lion before he in private before Goliath in public verse 2 of chapter 37 Then he sent Eliakim who was over the household Shebna the scribe and the elders of the priests Covered with sackcloth to Isaiah the prophet the son of Amos I'm sure Hezekiah was thankful. He had somebody like Isaiah with him a man of God a man who knew the Lord and I think had a great influence on good King Hezekiah Verse 3 so these men go and Have they have this message from Hezekiah to Isaiah the prophet and they said to him thus says Hezekiah This day is a day of trouble and rebuke and blasphemy For the children have come to birth, but there is no strength to bring them forth Notice he says no strength this impresses me that a political leader If I can say that but Hezekiah was willing to say I can't do it.

No strength When's the last time you heard a politician say that? But if God is going to fight this battle, and he's the only one that could defend Judah against the mighty Assyrians Hezekiah and his people are gonna have to realize they can't do it themselves, but they need to trust in the Lord If they try to do it themselves God will just let him come to a point where they realize they can't do it And I don't know about you, but I find in my Christian life the series of things one thing after another I Come up against a challenge I can't do it and I have to just look to the Lord and maybe prior to that I tried You know wiggle it out figure it out Do something and then I find out I can't it's only then that I really depend on the Lord Verse 4 Hezekiah this message again to Isaiah He goes on to say it may be that the Lord your God will hear the words of the rabbi Sheikha Whom his master the king of Assyria is sent to reproach the living God And will rebuke the words which the Lord your God has heard Therefore lift up your prayer for the remnant that is left He's saying Isaiah pray for us pray for us It's not one of the things we read in Isaiah in Ephesians 6 at the end praying always Verse 5 and I'm just going to finish with verse 7 here So the servants of King Hezekiah came to Isaiah and Isaiah said to them Thus you shall say to your master Thus says the Lord Don't be afraid of the words which you have heard with which the servants of the king of Assyria have blasphemed me Surely I will send a spirit upon him and he shall hear a rumor and return to his own land And I will cause him to fall by the sword in his own land Now if you were King Hezekiah, what would you do with this? Isaiah gives him a word from the Lord Basically saying the Lord says I'm gonna take care of Assyria. I'm gonna take care of Sennacherib the king. He's gonna go back home I'm gonna send him back home.

I'll take care of him, but the army's still out there So they had the option To believe what the Lord was saying or not brother sister. I would suggest you and I have the same option in our struggles in our battles Against the evil one Thank God we have his word We have the option of just believing what he says You know faith comes by hearing hearing by the Word of God New Testament says we walk by faith. We live by faith not by sight a big part of the armor for the Christian is Using God's Word effectively Asking the Lord to teach us Help us to understand help us to have a balanced understanding and put it into practice and Use it stand on it depend on it Now I'm not going to take time to finish this story Perhaps if the Lord leads and there's opportunity tomorrow.

I'll finish here, but Most of you will know the story God doesn't let him down God takes care of them because they're willing to put their trust in him against a tremendous onslaught of subterfuge of Efforts by the Assyrians to undermine their trust in God And I guess the takeaway here is the devil uses the same tactics with us He'll do anything to keep us from trusting the Lord not some Pollyanna Hope so type of thing, but just to rest and what God says and To know who God is that what he wants to do for us